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Super Mario Bros: The Early Years - Beta updated 6-27-17

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Beta BPS Patch Updated 6-27

LEVELS: 40
EXITS: 47
DIFFICULTY: Normal

After almost a year, this hack is finished. It's one of my shorter full-length hacks due to having a largely SMB1-style structure of four levels per World, with the exception of the final world, which has eight. Foregrounds and most backgrounds, along with several sprites and global objects, are hand-drawn, as is common with my chocolate hacks.

To find the secret exits in this hack, you must first collect nine Green Stars. Green Stars act as this game's Yoshi Coins, but unlike the vanilla Yoshi Coins, they carry over between levels, and once you collect one, you won't lose it, even if you die.

In a way, this hack has two endings, depending on whether or not you've found at least one of the warps to World 9, i.e. a secret exit.

Here are some sample screens.






Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)

I beta tested this hack just now and I found 2 glitches!
1. If you start World 2-2 at the midway point while being big or fire Mario, you'll get crushed to death!
2. Sometimes when you complete a level with the Normal Exit, You'll see the clock still ticking down and when it hits zero, it may cause you to die!
Amazing hack otherwise! #smw{:TUP:}
Thanks for pointing those issues out. I worked around the first by changing the midway entrance type and location. I have no idea why midway entrances involving pipes in water levels have to bug out like that. I remember having a similar issue with Starlight Island Adventure.

I'll have to talk to Erik557 about the timer issue. Touching the flagpole is supposed to stop the timer, and it has done so with other Status Bars, but not his.
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
I've encountered this issue by myself when I moderated a hack in the section, however I was not able to reproduce it. I don't know why only my bar would do it and not the rest of the custom status bars though... I'll have a check of it later.

FAKE EDIT: Try using this modified version of the status bar instead.
I would like to test this one.
Thanks. I'll go ahead and add your name to the Testers section of the credits.

EDIT: @zacmario You might want to test the latest beta.

Changes from the OP-linked beta:
* Altered the midway entrance of 2-2 so that it no longer bugs up and kills Big/Fire Mario
* Fixed the timer so that it stops when Mario touches the flagpole (Thanks to Erik557 for that.)
* Fixed some instances of cutoff noticed by ForthRightMC and myself
* Fixed the initial flags on 9-4's OW level tile so that the player can't move upward from it until actually completing the level. ForthRightMC pointed this error out too.
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
Hello,
I haven't finished testing the whole hack, but there are still things I'd like to point out:

Quick complaint
I find the flagpole quite close and thus it's quite easy to get 1-Ups, I feel like it should be moved just a few blocks down.

In 2-3,
there is a subsection with a Green Star, this section as a whole was fine. However, on closer inspection of the tiles used you can see the slightest bit of cut-off [See figure 1]

Figure 1, 2-3's Sub-Section.

Another issue
is the secret exits in the game. When you touch them they disappear and take 9 of your Green Stars with them, but if the block is in a subsection and you return to said subsection, then the block will reappear, but since you've lost your 9 Green Stars you cannot reenter the area and claim the secret exit. [See figure 2]
I suggest disabling the removal of the Green Stars and just require an increasing number to exit, (E.G. 9 Green Stars required, 18 Green Stars required, 27, etc.)

Figure 2, Player is Stuck Because They Left The Subsection.

Finally,
Is it just me or does the swimming Mario graphic look a bit disjointed?


EDIT - 1
Well,
that was quick. It's been, what, 10 minutes? Anyways, in 3-2 there is a Green Star protected by a Gao [Yes, that is what they're called], and you have to hit the blocks under it to kill it. However, if you hit the middle block [See figure 3] and you are either Super Mario or Fire Mario, then you'll get hurt.

Speaking of Gao
They act a bit like Thowmps, where only shells in the right sprite slots can kill them...


Figure 3, a Line of 3 Blocks

EDIT - 2
But wait, there's more!
So yeah, in 5-2 you also misplaced almost all the track tiles [See figure 4], and at the end of the level, if you carry a Buzzy Beetle with you, it's graphic will corrupt [See figure 5]. Since there are no sprites at the end of the level, maybe just leave the sprite GFX as they were...


Figure 4, Many Incorrect Tiles...


Figure 5, That's Meant to be a Buzzy Beetle...

EDIT - 3
In 9-3,
You can scroll the screen up showing cut-off. [See figure 6]
If you carry a Mechakoopa from the first section into the second section it'll turn invisible.
In the second section, you can kill yourself quite easily if you continue to walk into the Layer 2 Smash. [See figure 7]
In 9-5 (Airship), you can 'kill' the nuts on the screws with a shell. [See figure 8]
The Boss Bass you have feel a bit cheaty. No matter where you touch it you get eaten, even in areas where you expect just to be damaged (E.G. It's head).
Finally:
I have no idea how to get the final Green Star in 6-2...

Anyways, I'll stop here for the day. I'm need a break from this hack.


Figure 6, Screenscrolling is Set to 'Scroll if Flying.'


Figure 7, Walking Into Layer 2 May Kill you. BONUS: You May Get Stuck at This Section if You Miss-Time the Spawning of the Fire.


Figure 8, ded

Anyway, that's all I've spotted so far, I'll continue to edit this post if I spot other things and when I finish I'll turn this into a proper review of the hack.

- Wii2
 "Great work! Because this message is prerecorded, any observations related to your performance are speculation on our part. Please disregard any undeserved compliments."
1-1 I felt was fun way to start. I like the young Mario look.
1-2 Again, basic and fun.
1-3 Still going good.
1-4 A few minor slowdowns, but still very playable. I liked this castle.
The one thing that caught my eye was already mentioned, and that is the star blocks reappearing. I liked how I get sneak peek at Bowsers castle.
2-1 Was good.
2-2 Was good.
2-3 Was good.
2-4 I liked the design of this castle. Slowdown took a huge hit though. Tides, sprite status bar, ball and chain is causing it. I don't know if the custom sprite smb3 circle thing might help? Instead of ball and chain. I'm already sure you don't want a custom chip but the dsp-1 one helps limp through ball and chains with less slowdown. Aslo Claw grips rocks move fast and cause a crush in the wall in the left where the two blocks meet. One rocks also dragged me under floor by the water hole. Maybe slow rocks down a bit?
Overall I liked world 2, I really like underwater levels, and felt you was well designed.

3-1 Is good.
3-2 I really liked this level, I liked SML alot, and could see it in the design. The spiders turn green when decending, not sure if thats intended. Also I carried a shell to flag,because I needed a mushroom. I hit the flag and watched my mushroom disappear above the ceiling ;(
3-3 Was quite a while before I found a mushroom. I think I like quicksand you can't run in better.
3-4 I liked this castle, but tricylde is on steroids. Maybe I'm missing something, I can't beat him.
4-1 is good.
4-2 is good.
4-3 is good.
4-4 is good.
5-1 is good.
5-2 is good.
5-3 is good.
5-4 is good.
6-1 is good.
6-2 is good.
6-3 Had an issue that is fixed.
6-4 is good.
7-1 Balloons can fly over the whole level, finishing the level while on the ballon above the screen equals death.
@Wii2:
I've fixed most of those things, but there are some that I just don't know how I'd fix or why they're glitching, such as the crushing death if you just TOUCH Layer 2 in the second part of 9-3 or the nuts being killable via shell. I suppose I COULD either get rid of the Koopas or have shell-less ones, but either would negate some of the challenge of the level. The disappearing Mecha-Koopa upon entering the second part of 9-3 also stumps me. I have No More Sprite Tile Limits enabled for that room, and the Mecha-Koopa graphics are still being loaded in there.

@zacmario:
I'll see about slowing down Clawgrip's rocks and maybe trying to minimize slowdown in the second part of 2-4 without negating the challenge. Lag seems to be a pretty big problem with this, but I feel that using SA-1 would be tedious with all the ASM I have in the ROM.

Oh...To kill Tryclyde, just kick the Throw Blocks at him when they drop.
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
this hack has issues. this hack has many issues. as of right now i am unsure if i will finish playing this hack, but i will share some things i have noticed. (edit; yeah im never finishing this lmao)

your first slew of levels just utilize basic koopas and goombas. i know you want to walk the player into your hack (for some reason), but i mean even smw started off with interesting sprites like the rex and the banzai bill, the second level had charging chucks, the third level was an athletic level and then the fourth had spike balls. this has... goombas and koopas, followed by some more goombas and koopas, maybe a piranha plant or two, and nothing of any real substance.

secondly, this hack suffers from slowdown in a shit ton of areas. this is primarily because of your sprite status bar. theres a reason other sprite status bars (like the dkc status bar and lx5's status bar) disappear when theyre no longer needed. pretty much every encounter with more than like 4 enemies on screen causes noticeable slowdown. this is also hilariously evident in the first castle, where you have goomba spawners that launch out a million of those fuckers to instantly slow the game down to a crawl. the water castle also has this issue pretty strongly. i would suggest either using a layer 3 status bar or using a sprite status bar that disappears when it is not needed, cos your alternative of cutting down sprite usage even more is just going to make this hack even more boring.

thirdly, i find it odd how you have chosen to replace the majority of the graphics, but not all of them. every unchanged smw graphic clashes slightly with your gfx. i also really am not a fan of your recurring graphical trope of creating dirt that looks like this:

this looks like you just took the same two 8x8s and just flipped them. it looks really fucking bad, and i would strongly suggest making more fluid looking patterns a la smw or making more evidently noticeably patterns (like you have in your third level).

the last thing is the fact that this hack is rather boring. a hack being easy does not mean it should have little effort into enemy placement or level design: i played through 2 worlds and every level felt like the same left to right run and jump and avoid goombas and koopas. there is so little individual identity to these levels past their graphical treatment and very little to rope the player in to having a genuinely good time. i would not be surprised if what took the longest with this hack was drawing the graphics for these tilesets - the level design seems to be done rather quickly and haphazardly with seemingly no genuine consideration of whether it will be an interesting and memorable experience. you also take ideas and reuse them multiple levels in a row: the first three levels are all the same goomba and koopas with piranha plants, levels 3 and 4 of world 2 both use the same crabs (which i thought i wouldnt be able to jump on cos theyre crabs, but apparently you can), and the first 3 levels of world 9 all utilize the same fucking fire pillars. judging by these three instances i cannot help but assume this may be a recurring issue with this hack.

anyway, i might as well show off some things i noticed playing through the first two worlds (and a bit of world 9). i noticed some other things pointed out in this thread already, but i have no reason to repeat them.



this looks noticeably miscolored.



i dont know if this patch will fix a custom sprite goomba, but it will fix the koopas doing this (which is very easy to make happen since you give the player a million fire flowers)



good boss 👏👏👏



good boss 2.0 👏👏👏 (also the double doors not acting like double doors is silly)



obviously you can see the issue here.



🤔



obviously you are aware that the player can swim under levels in underwater stuff, but i noticed in this spot i'd randomly activate a note block and die instantly. i would suggest looking into a floor generator through levelasm or some shit so the player cant swim under, or using a patch that raises the death area up.



the fact that these end blocks also act as conveyors is ass. honestly i want to take a moment to talk about how not fun this level is. it is way harder than any level before it and way harder than the level after it: there is just too much shit going on. you have a million thwomps going every which way, you have conveyors everywhere so the player can barely catch a break, random mecha koopas who serve no purpose and are easy to deal with, the third instance of fire pillars in a row, and layer 2 smashers that i can die if i run into from the side if the conveyor pushes me into it. there is just way too much going on here and so little focus.

it is evident that this hack is not really for me. i don't really like the notion that this is more in the vein of mario world or something (in the sense that it is supposed to be a fun rompy simple experience), because i think even mario world crafted a unique identity for itself and the levels would often rope the player in and create a fun experience. i think this weighs too heavily on reusing the same ideas and has too little focus on level design that it becomes a heavily uninteresting project.

edit; you can probably disable nuts being killable by shell with the .cfg editor, though i'll also take this second to talk about how i think it looks pretty bad that the nut doesnt have gfx when its moving. it looks rather stationary when you jump from it rather than in its original games where it would move.
Well it's shame to have that castle change. Frankly you've done a spectacular job avoiding slowdown with sprite status bar in a reg rom. You should test disco's dsp patch, it will help that castle. I mean if it really came to it, I can help conversion to sa-1. I haven't seen many complain on slowdown so maybe it's really not huge of a problem either.

I see others complain it's to easy, but one of the reasons I like your hacks is because it isn't a chore to play and you can actually relax and enjoy Mario as Nintendo has done for years. Way to many hackers make the mistake of thinking extremely hard difficultly makes fun, but many casual gamers disagree . Yes, hardcore players I understand, there is a niche out there too.


Also, it's matter of prefrence but you may consider moving pocupuffer so he appears after the mid-point in 2-3. Currently if you die and restart at the mid-way you get a bit of a free pass because the intended puffer is no longer there. However, he was the cause of my death. So I was pleased to not see him again.
I checked the .cfg for the Nut, and I don't see any option for shell immunity. As for animation, I'm not sure the nut has it.

Slowdown in the hack will be a very difficult obstacle to work around without dumbing down my levels. I briefly tested the DSP-1 patch, and it didn't seem to do much to fix the lag.

I've fixed most of the cutoff, but I still need to fix the color on Mario's sleeves in his climbing frame.

That issue where you can be killed by the Layer 2 smashers even if you're not actually being crushed by then appears to be a bug caused by the conveyor blocks I'm using. I know there are alternatives made by GHB, but I don't know if their required UberASM can be used with UberASMTool.
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
Ich habe deinen Hack Getestet und muss sagen er ist Super Geworden wehrend des Testes ist mir Aufgefahllen das man ein Level in Welt 9 Überspringen kann und Direkt zum Luftschiff Level Kommt was ich mich auch Frage ist wenn man genügend Sterne Hat und ein Secret Exit 2x Macht
könnte es dann Passieren das man die Restlichen Secret Exits nicht mehr Bekommt ? Die Levels waren alle Gut schaffbar und für Speedruns Geeignet
das Video zum Beta Test folgt Später :D
Mein Youtube Kanal
http://www.youtube.com/user/Lordkronos100?feature=mhum


My Youtube Channel
http://www.youtube.com/user/Lordkronos100?feature=mhum


GreenHammerBro's Pit Fix seems to fix 2-2 so that the player can't swim under the level. I tried applying Player X Speed Fix to try working around that glitch with the right-moving conveyor belts, but it doesn't seem to fix it. The same blocks were used in Kola Kingdom Quest and Bowser's Cataclysmic Trap. What seems to happen is that the player just clips through the solid wall/smasher when the right button is held down. I'll look into some other bugfix patches and consult an ASM person if nothing helps.

UPDATED BETA

@Lordkronos100: I can't really read your bug report since it's in German.
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
Originally posted by lordkronos100
Ich habe deinen Hack Getestet und muss sagen er ist Super Geworden wehrend des Testes ist mir Aufgefahllen das man ein Level in Welt 9 Überspringen kann und Direkt zum Luftschiff Level Kommt was ich mich auch Frage ist wenn man genügend Sterne Hat und ein Secret Exit 2x Macht
könnte es dann Passieren das man die Restlichen Secret Exits nicht mehr Bekommt ? Die Levels waren alle Gut schaffbar und für Speedruns Geeignet
das Video zum Beta Test folgt Später :D

(rough) Translation:

I've tested your hack and have to say that I think it's great.
While testing I noticed that you can skip a level in world 9 to get directly to the airship level.
I also asked myself: If you have enough stars and do a secret exit twice, could it happen that you can't do the other secret exits anymore?
All levels were doable with ease and are suitable for speedrunning.
A video of the beta test will be added later :D
My Youtube channel

Currently working on:
Project C

Finished project:
Thanks for translating, NGB, and thanks for the kind words, Lordkronos.
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
Too bad dsp didn't help, it helped me just enough to get by.
I tested world 4 and 5, I found no major issues and only minor slowdown spots. I think hammer bros hammer is backwards when he is holding it. I also saw a glitch with a wiggler by the munchers, but I was never able to recreate it. There is a hammer bro in 5-4 that can get stuck between two solid blocks that are on top of each other. the area has two of them. The top sometimes glitched. Probably not worth changing anything though it happened 1/5 times.
One thing that does bother me though. I feel like if there is a flagpole you should always have a way to catch the top, even if the way is well hidden.

As nice as the status bar is, maybe you should consider ditching it. You risk seriously ruining all your levels if you to make it work without sa-1. I'm sure there are plenty of people who can help you convert this (including myself) if you choose too.

Edit did you consider trying roto disc instead of ball and chain. Not sure if it's a little less to process or not.
There is a lot of stuff I would need to convert, and not all of it can be done automatically. A block and 8 sprites give errors in SA-1 Converter. I'd also need to convert 9 patches and 23 UberASM codes. One of the patches consists of 3 files. If I were to enlist the help of someone who could do SA-1 conversions, should I just put everything but an SMW ROM in a .zip folder and upload it someplace?
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
I did the patches (except one) last night. I know altyoshi coin works for sure. I didn't see the uber codes, but we'll just see if we get what I got already working.
OK. I suppose I could give it another try. I was getting very worked up over the complication of converting to SA-1 last night. I'm assuming that the one patch that didn't work was No More Sprite Tile Limits. Apparently, that gets installed as part of the SA-1 pack, so it wouldn't be necessary. The others would be, although the Circular Fadein is just a cosmetic thing. Most of the UberASM could be considered cosmetic as well, being HDMA gradients, but the hack's visuals would suffer more without those than by sticking to the vanilla level fade-in mosaic.
Quintesson Judge: Silence, or you will be held in contempt of this court!
Hot Rod: I have nothing but contempt for this court!
- Transformers the Movie (1986)
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